


The Tyger

by thelongcon (rainer76)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Gen, Loose Canon, Manipulation, Set early season two, Unexpected Conversations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-13 08:01:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9114190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainer76/pseuds/thelongcon
Summary: Will has become feral to her – tiger tiger burning bright – his eyes bore holes in her skin.  His orange jumpsuit stripped black by prison bars.  There’s something shifting, altering the shape of his bones, tweaking the construction, and when she looks at Hannibal – when speaking about Will – she imagines it’s avarice, anticipation in the stance of his body.Or an unconventional conversation.





	

  
“Did you fantasise about him?”

Conversing with Hannibal can be like a dance, a flow of ingenious words and metaphor, of clever humour, twists and innuendo; other times, Alana reminds herself, it’s like being hit by a two by four.  She pauses with the knife embedded half way through a carrot – the vegetable skidding on white Damascus dinner plates – and blinks at him. “I’m entirely sure that’s _not_ appropriate conversation. Or even polite conversation, for that matter.”

“He’s not your patient. No longer even a friend after recent events.” Hannibal twists his forearm until his wrist is in plain view. “I would have thought there was no harm in the enquiry.” He smiles faintly, mischief in his eyes. “And my ego can withstand a battering or two.”

Alana’s gaze is drawn to the jagged line running up his forearm, stark as a railway track. Maybe he needs to talk about it - what was done to him, and by whom - maybe it’s just a way of approaching a deeper conversation. Will’s no longer her friend, no longer someone Alana cares to associate with, cutting him loose was the most freeing decision she’s made in a long while, and Alana swore she’d help Hannibal recover, however she may.

Between them, they buried Will alive last night. They slept on his shallow grave.

She can’t understand why Hannibal keeps dragging his name into the light, unearthing the dirt from his unruly coffin. Resentfully, she says: “Perhaps. The empathy disorder raises issues…I imagine he was a very accommodating lover between the sheets.” Alana won’t categorise it as a fantasy, the image of wild curls between her legs, his mouth busy on her clit, shoulders stretching her thighs apart. She’d thought about it, but done nothing in the end, unwilling to take the risk.

“Funny,” Hannibal chews his meat. “I speculated he would be awful.”

She barely hides her smile. Also, that ego of his isn’t as staunch as advertised. “So you’ve considered it,” she teases, because that seems the most pertinent point in this entire conversation. “Sleeping with Will Graham?”

“As you say an empathy disorder raises questions,” he answers, blithely.

Alana frowns, spine straightening.There’s a reason why you don’t build a structure on a fault-line, and the foundations of their relationship feel shaky, too new to properly navigate. Something shifts in her awareness of it, of _them_ , deep and at ground level she’s bothered by Hannibal’s nonchalance.  "He’d know what you want,” Alana explores. “There’s an appeal to that. I imagine it appeals to many people.”

Even you.

“Not necessary. He’d _feel_ what you wanted, the same emotion would run over him like water, and experiencing it he would want it too.” Hannibal’s eyes are dark, void of emotion; he dices the meat into square bites, almost child size. Alana can see the sharp points of his incisors as he speaks, the hint of incivility between his lips. “You desire his mouth between your legs, and suddenly he’s pushing your head down, rudely, wanting your lips around his cock instead. You want to be filled, taken, and he moans about you pegging him, about being penetrated. A singularly frustrating experience, I would imagine, to have him desire what you want at the _exact_ moment you want it. A mirrored reflection of need but with no compromise.”

"You've given it some thought.” Faintly, Alana puts her knife and fork down.

“An intellectual exercise. Will has hinted his experiences with sex are not conducive to an on-going relationship. A curiosity, given his appearance.”

The spike of unease rises again. Alana studies the plate, rare meat, blood smeared sauce, the greens blanched, a bright poisonous leaf trailing over the plate. “It’s a garnish,” Hannibal had explained. “Refrain from ingesting it, please.” Hannibal watches as Alana crosses the utensils over her plate, signalling she’s finished, and adds off-handedly: “He’s handsome, is he not?”

She wonders about the kiss - if it was Will _wanting_ to kiss her – or as Hannibal is suggesting it was Alana kissing a spectre of herself, a reflection buried under the surface of Will’s skin. She’s not that much of a narcissist to find the thought appealing. She wonders, bleakly, if Will had ever told Hannibal about it. “You think his empathy is that strong?”

“I think he has better control of it now than he ever has.”

“In a mental asylum?”

"It didn't hinder his attempt on _my_ life.”

“I’m not sure if that’s the type of control we should be celebrating.”

"Will retreats when he is overwhelmed. He had Wolf Trap, his dogs, and a hermit’s quiet solitude to restore himself; in Chilton’s gentle care he has none of those resources. Only the mental projection of a stream to escape those closest. And the only person he truly wants access too - the only mind he wants to understand - isn’t his fellow prisoners, beside him constantly but – “

“You,” Alana finishes. There’s a sweet over-bite as she disclaims. “There’s that ego, I see.”  Alana sips the wine, wishing in her back teeth it were beer instead. “He talks like you, you know? Long meandering conversations, jumping from association to association like it’s a game of agility. He’s terse when speaking with Jack, flowery with you, and with me he's all gentle tones.”

“I think focusing on one person does him good. Forts crumble over time, barriers tumble to mortar under sustained pressure – if he has to feel someone else’s emotions – perhaps it is best to turn to water, become fluid, and allow entry instead of barricading against it.  Minimise it to one of a similar ilk.  A conjoining of need.”

“And you don’t mind being the centre of his attention.”  Crazy as it is.

She can still see Hannibal martyred on the cross if she closes her eyes. The slow drip of water, the shadows on the walls, the rattle of the bucket as it was kicked out from under Hannibal's feet. The fear that claimed her then, that they came too late, that she had misjudged Will and got it so horribly wrong. Hannibal acts as if it’s nothing, as if he's charmed by the intention, and it infuriates Alana suddenly.  Hannibal nearly died that day, would have, if not for her intervention.  The anger is fast, a rousing flood. “He _mutilated_ you, Hannibal! Christ.”

They buried him last night, cut him loose, and Will is everywhere, a crosshatch on Hannibal’s skin. Had she fantasised about Will Graham? Once. But not for a long time since.

She wants to drop the conversation, she wants to talk about _them,_ who they are, where they’re going, she wants _one_ night with her lover without a third party hovering over the proceedings.  Is he obsessed with you, Hannibal - she wants to rant - or are you obsessed with him?  The Lecter sigil is turned in on itself, the snake coiled, feeding off it’s own tail. It’s hard to know where they’re at with each other – it’s hard to know where Hannibal/Will start and end.

She thought the nightmare had come to a finish last night – the friendship she held for Will, the speculation she once felt - buried six feet under without remorse.

As Hannibal so helpfully pointed out, she can’t tell if Will genuinely cared for her, or if he was only reflecting. She thought he was innocent, until he proved he was a killer. She thought he was honest, until he displayed a knack for machinations, plucking Mathew Brown’s strings like maestro.  "I don't fantasise about him,” she answers, curtly. It would be a horror story, looking for the silhouette, wondering if his smile’s a little off, if his cadence held an (un)familiar ring, if she could hear his sentences in another’s persons mouth, and found her eyes sliding for the glint of hidden steel. “Whatever feelings I had for Will Graham, they’re unstrung.”

“I apologise,” Hannibal says, formally. His eyes look kinder as he leans forward. The scar down his forearm’s a closed mouth. “I didn’t mean to distress you. I never wished to alienate you from Will. To have Will become so isolated in his incarceration.”

“I haven’t seen him at prison since he attacked you,” Alana confesses. “I don’t _want_ to.”

“And you shouldn’t,” Hannibal agrees. His mouth curves sensuously, he reaches for her wrist. “I would have you surrounded by your friends, Alana, with the people you feel _safest_ with.”

Alana doesn't want to see herself reflected in a lover – she wants to celebrate the differences, puzzle the nuances of individuality - she thought Hannibal was the same, with his eclectic circle of friends, with his European style.  She thought Hannibal would choose diversity over the animal comfort of pack – that he wouldn’t delight in the recognition of _kind_.

Will has become feral to her – tiger tiger burning bright – his eyes bore holes in her skin. His orange jumpsuit is stripped black by the prison bars. There’s something shifting, altering the shape of his bones, tweaking the construction, and when she looks at Hannibal – when speaking about Will – she imagines it’s avarice, anticipation in the stance of Hannibal's body, in the tone of his voice.

She buries the feeling in a restless grave - one of many of their bloodless murders.


End file.
